Ex-bank officer gets 21 months in fraud case

Nov. 24, 2013

Written by

Ce’Dra Jackson

The Tennessean

A Gordonsville, Tenn., man was sentenced Thursday in U.S. District Court in Nashville to 21 months in federal prison for filing false bank statements and committing bank fraud.

Joe N. Vance, 50, who was a loan officer at Wilson Bank and Trust from 1990 to 1996 and president of The Community Bank of Smith County from 1996 to 2006, pleaded guilty in April to three counts of false bank entries, reports and transactions with intent to defraud and one count of bank fraud.

According to a federal grand jury, loan applicants and customers identified only by initials received questionable loans arranged by Vance beginning in 2003. Over the next four years, Vance approved loans with false reasons and purposes, for which he personally received thousands of dollars, according to the indictment. He used cashier’s checks and wire transfers to move money through several bank accounts, some belonging to other people.

Vance also approved an additional loan for a person, also identified by the grand jury only by initials, when there was not an application or a CD that had been entered as security for the loan.

Vance also will have to serve two years of supervised release after he gets out of prison, as well as pay $521,582.99 restitution.

Ce’Dra Jackson is a reporter for the Seigenthaler News Service–TSU. She can be reached at cebojac@gmail.com.